Parlour Tricks
by want your rad bromance
Summary: AU, M26, implied 69M; M.M's face really does look like a fat, angry kitten's when she's mad, he muses as she continues to beat him over the head with a ruby-studded handbag.  It all works out, though, since Fran actually likes cats.


I'm pretty sure I'm one of the only people who ships this, but I really think they're an amusing pair. As I see them, M.M. is a giant tsundere who chases after Mukuro, but always ends up back with Fran, whether she likes it or not. Fran really doesn't care. xD This whole thing was inspired by Fran's new character song, "Special Illusion", just because he sounds cute saying "I'm a top magician" in surprisingly good English. In regards to the AU world this takes place in, just swap mafia families with guilds and make the dying will flames a type of magic. I might expand on this world- it's also supposed to be more of a steampunk thing than modern or medieval. Fran is also really hard to write- getting his penchant for cheesiness, his apathy, and his childishness all at once is really difficult. Regardless, enjoy!

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Not five minutes after he's opened his tent flaps for nighttime business, M.M. is storming in a hussy hurricane of red and green. She slams a flyer down on his table, rattling the wood and sending knickknacks flying. Her colour is high, her teeth are bared in what Fran has to say is a typical over-reaction. Personally, he thinks the flyer is a fine work of art.

"What is this, you little brat?" She hisses, abruptly shoving her face into his. His expression is as flat as it had been before she decided to come and make his evening hard on the ears.

"Not a little brat," he counters, leaning back on his heels and snapping his finger. "I'm a top magician now, you know." She looks about ready to blow fire from her nostrils or something. Actually, it would be amusing, provided she doesn't destroy his tent.

"A _what_? Don't smirch Mukuro-chan's great name by calling yourself something dumb like that! If you can't even tell the difference between magic and illusions, you don't deserve to be his apprentice!" Fran wonders if she can tell the difference. Probably not, he decides with a sigh.

"Magic and illusions are pretty much the same thing, right? They're good crowd-pleasers."

"Wrong," another voice calls from the adjoining tent. Fran doesn't bother to dodge the artfully tossed kitchen knife that now wobbles from his hat. Crocodile tears well up in his eyes, and he brushes one away forlornly.

"Master only says that because he likes to scare the crowds instead of giving them a good show," he retorts sulkily, sounding every bit the whiny apprentice.

"Wrong again, little one," his master retorts, still not bothering to make himself seen. "Now, show my guest in, won't you?" Fran points to the flap conjoining their tents with one hand, extracting the knife with the other. It comes away bloodless, and he tosses it over his shoulder absently. M.M. has forgotten him entirely to flounce away, anger completely transmuted into girlish glee. The change is something Fran can only attribute to magic, considering her normal temperament is best compared to a fat, angry kitten with sharp claws. Not that she's fat, but fat people are always more irritable, so it stays as part of his opinion.

Any hopes he had about a nice, quiet evening coming up with awesome poses for his next show are shattered when sounds the likes of which he frequently hears coming from the quarters of a certain lightning-wielding dirty old man begin to come from the other tent. The thin indigo fabric does nothing to dampen them, and he can't reach his ears to cover them from underneath his ridiculous hat. He is supposed to be on an "independent mission" from the group of the world's top combat mages, but he knows that Bel has an annoying habit of following him around and enacting various plans to kill him, none of which come close to success. Casting a baleful glance in the direction if his master's half of the tent, he wonders if their lame information network has figured out that he's working as a showman instead of assassinating some big guild leader.

M.M. is gone by the time Fran returns from his evening show, and his master with her, most likely having returned control of the body to its original owner and letting him wander back to one of the many Millefiore guildhouses in the area. Being facetious simply for the sake of being facetious, Fran pokes his head into his master's half of the tent and finds it nearly empty, save for a bed and a particular object he really, honestly did not need to see. Picking it up gingerly between two fingers, he holds it at arm's length, hoping the potential amusement factor will outweigh the risk of cooties.

The next time he sees M.M., he brings her screeching to a, well, _screeching_ halt by pulling out the offending object from months before: hot pink panties with a double 'M' on the rear in what appears to be sequins.

"You left this in my tent," he comments blandly, looking for all the world like he doesn't care about the disgust on Chikusa's face, the bawdy amusement on Ken's, and the especially livid expression on M.M.'s. The injuries he receives are worth the prank, in his opinion. Her face really does look like a fat, angry kitten's when she's mad, he muses as she continues to beat him over the head with a ruby-studded handbag that cannot be filled with anything but bricks. It all works out, though, since he actually likes cats.


End file.
